A transit Stop in Portland, OR provides a comfortable waiting area for patrons and allow for unobstructed passage by pedestrians.
Source: Michael Hintze, TDG

Sheltered seating in Seattle, Washington.

Transit Stop Improvements

Transit stops should be highly visible locations that pedestrians of all abilities can reach easily by means of accessible travel routes. The transit stop location should be fully accessible to pedestrians in wheelchairs, should have paved connections to sidewalks where landscape buffers exist, and should not block pedestrian travel on the sidewalk. Adequate room should exist to operate wheelchair lifts. Additional information on making bus stops accessible can be found in Chapter 3 of Accessible Rights-of-Way: A Design Guide. It is desirable to provide a continuous minimum 8 feet wide area to match the length of the longest bus in fleet, or at least the distance between the front and rear bus doors. A larger pad area, additional sidewalk capacity, or a bus bulb should be considered in areas with higher pedestrian volumes using the sidewalk and high transit use.

Other treatments that increase the comfort of transit stops include sufficient lighting, sheltered seating and lean bars, trash receptacles, and transit route information. Increasingly, bar or Quick Response (QR) codes at transit stops allow patrons with camera phones to obtain the latest schedule information including the arrival time of the next bus or train.

Purpose

Good public transportation is as important to the quality of a community as good roads. Well-designed transit routes and accessible and comfortable stops are essential to a usable system. Transit stops should be designed to provide safe and convenient access and should be comfortable places for people to wait.